International Journal of
Human Sciences Research
v. 3, n. 3, 2023
All content in this magazine is licensed under a Creative Com- mons Attribution License. Attri- bution-Non-Commercial-Non- Derivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0).
QUALITY IN
UNIVERSITIES IN MEXICO
Maricela Serrano Fragoso
Professor of the Academy of Informatics in the Interdisciplinary Professional Unit in Engineering and Advanced Technologies, IPN-UPIITA, CDMX Paola Nayeli Cortez Herrera
Professor at the Academy of Informatics in the Interdisciplinary Professional Unit in Engineering and Advanced Technologies,IPN-UPIITA, CDMX Yesenia Eleonor González Navarro Professor at the Academy of Systems in the Interdisciplinary Professional Unit in Engineering and Advanced Technologies, IPN-UPIITA, CDMX
Abstract: Universities has been transformed, globalization has allowed this change. But how do you know if things are being done well in Universities Institutions? How to guarantee quality? Although some institutions in Mexico occupy a place in a worldwide ranking year after year, what is being doing to continue in that ranking and move up in position? This work shows a summary of when the term quality in education appeared in Mexico and makes references to criteria evaluated by accreditation institutions.
An accredited academic program allows having a reference on the implementation of quality in educational processes. Quality in universities is a key factor in the future of a country, which is why it must be promoted by the members of the educational process.
Keywords: Universities, quality, accreditation.
INTRODUCTION
The term quality in universities was mentioned for the first time at the Regional Conference on Policy and Strategies for the Transformation of Universities in Latin America and the Caribbean (CRESALC), in Havana, Cuba, 1996, the work presented by Carlos Tünnermann Bernheim had an extension approved by the Institute of Universities in Latin America and the Caribbean (IESALC), organized by UNESCO, 1997.
In this work, Carlos Tünnerman Berheim emphasizes that universities is growing in an inappropriate way without any revision, alluding that for this they generated three more observations, which are institutional autonomy, academic freedom and viability of the university (Tünnerman, 1998).
Due to the transformation of universities at the end of the 20th century, where the term globalization is present, as well as the new teaching-learning process with the incorporation of technologies, the social
changes caused by the economic and political sectors of the nations; It is necessary to stop and evaluate the educational model to find out if you actually have a quality universities for life.
INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS
The United Nations Organization (UN) is made up of a series of international organizations such as the World Bank (WB);
the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO); the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and, in Latin America, the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the Economic Commission for Latin America (CEPAL), (Maldonado, 2000), with specific activities for each of them. To be the educational sector one of its priorities, as is the case of universities in Mexico where the term of quality in universities originates from the recommendations issued by international organizations.
QUALITY OF UNIVERSITIES IN MEXICO
The World Bank’s main objective is to grant loans to developing countries, and thus establish new economic, social and educational policies for member countries;
In universities, it requests that the plans and programs be delivered with quality, which implies modifying and updating the learning- teaching process.
In Mexico, the term quality was presented for the first time in the National Development Plan of the six-year term of Carlos Salinas de Gortari, specifically in the Education Sector Program, entitled “National Program for Educational Modernization 1990-1994”, in which it was indicated the quality of the educational social function in congruence with the purposes of national development.
Educational modernization implies defining priorities; review and rationalize educational costs, as well as consider a new educational model, decentralization of education, useful education for life, excellent and innovative universities, as well as open education to provide opportunities for those most in need (Official Gazette of the Federation, 1990).
Again in the six-year term of Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de León in the National Development Plan and specifically in the Education Sector Plan, entitled “Educational Development Program 1995-2000”, he indicated among his objectives, the priorities and policies of the sector to ensure an education with sufficient and quality coverage, since it is necessary to lay the foundations for education in the 21st century. So, from the six-year term of Carlos Salinas de Gortari to date, the term quality in education is mentioned in each of the Education Sector Plans (Official Gazette of the Federation, 1993, 2003, 2008, 2020).
The term quality in universities has a meaning that is made up of various aspects such as philosophical, pedagogical, economic, cultural and social that must comply with regulations, such is the case of (Márquez, 2004) who accurately describes them from the following way:
• Quality in education in the philosophical aspect it is considered that its contents are relevant to the social group for which it is intended and, therefore, respond to their needs and aspirations.
• In the pedagogical aspect, quality implies that the goals proposed in the educational plans and programs are effectively covered.
• Economically, that the resources allocated to imparting it are used efficiently.
• Culturally, that the contents and teaching methods are relevant to the learning possibilities of the individuals and social conglomerates to which it is directed.
• In the social sphere, quality is achieved when the opportunities for access, permanence and completion of school cycles are equitably or evenly distributed, as well as those of obtaining similar results in learning among individuals from the various strata that make up society. (Marquez, 2004).
Figure 1 shows the criteria that define quality in education.
Figure 1 shows the criteria that allow measuring quality in universities, since through them it will be possible to examine and approve the characteristics and attributes of a program.
When a program meets the evaluation criteria for quality in education, it is considered that students will have skills such as: critical thinking, teamwork, leadership, the ability to express themselves orally and in writing in another language, and be autonomous, among others. more.
In order to obtain quality in universities, it is necessary for Universities Institutions (Universities) to be accredited periodically through specialized organizations, for example, for Universities in the engineering area, there is the Accreditation Council for Universities Education. Engineering (CACEI), being accreditation the process that guarantees quality in education where the following criteria are considered (CACEI, 2018):
The analysis criteria are:
1. Academic staff.
2. Students.
3. Curriculum.
Figure 1. Quality education criteria (Márquez, 2004).
4. Assessment and continuous improvement.
5. Infrastructure and equipment.
6. Institutional support.
Academic staff. The professionals who participate as academics in the program are sufficient and relevant, have an adequate combination of academic and professional training, have an adequate distribution of substantive activities, are evaluated and supported to improve themselves, and are involved in adapting the Study Plan.
Students. The educational program must demonstrate satisfactory and quality results in the procedures for admission, revalidation, monitoring of the school trajectory, counselling, tutoring and graduation of students within the institutional regulatory framework.
Curriculum. The educational program must have defined and published its
educational objectives, which must be consistent with the institutional mission, the needs of its interest groups.
Valuation and continuous improvement.
The educational program must have a systematic evaluation process that considers the results of the evaluation of its educational objectives, the achievement of the attributes of its graduates and the school performance indices, among others, with the representative participation of its interest groups, that influences the continuous improvement of the Educational Program.
Infrastructure and equipment. The Educational Program must have sufficient infrastructure and equipment, the ability to access computer resources and library services; guides and user manuals available, as well as a maintenance, modernization and updating program, to meet your own needs.
Institutional support. The Educational Program must demonstrate that institutional
support and leadership are based on efficient management, leadership and direction processes and are adequate to ensure its quality, continuity, as well as provide an environment in which learning results are achieved (CACEI, 2018).
When the Universities accredit the aforementioned criteria before CACEI or any accrediting body, only then can quality in universities be guaranteed, and this way the dimensions that Márquez (2004) shows us in figure 1 are fulfilled, such as the philosophical (Relevance), pedagogical (Efficacy), economic (Efficiency), cultural (Pertinence) and social (Equity).
The Universities form internal commissions to carry out self-evaluations in the academic units, the only drawback is that they are not periodic nor are the results evaluated for continuous improvement.
However, this would be very useful for the decision-making of the officials on duty.
Some public or private universities in Mexico do have accreditation for academic programs, unfortunately not all have this opportunity. It is necessary to mention that it implies a cost, in case of not being approved the money will not be returned by the accrediting body and if they request the accreditation process again they will have to pay again.
It is worth mentioning that public and private Mexican universities have been considered the best national and international universities. The following section graphically shows the position obtained in the evaluation where different aspects are considered.
RANKING OF PUBLIC AND PRIVATE UNIVERSITIES
In Mexico there is public and private universities. Public universities such as the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), the National Polytechnic Institute (IPN), the Metropolitan
Autonomous University (UAM), to name a few, are included in the ranking of the best universities in Mexico, in the private sphere it stands out the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM) in the ranking, see figure 2 (El Economista, 2020).
It is worth mentioning that Mexican universities have a place in the world ranking, see figure 2 (right side), such is the case again of UNAM, which has place 123 out of a total of 5,500 evaluated universities (Cybermetrics Lab, 2022).
CONCLUSIONS
Mexico modified its educational policies due to the recommendations of the World Bank. The proof is in the Education Sector Plan, since it is a national instrument of public policies, elaborated under the responsibility of the government, which offers a long-term vision of the educational system in the country and which details a coherent set of viable strategies for achieve goals and address difficulties.
This document expresses the term of quality in education, from the year 1988 to the present government 2018-2024. However, due to adverse situations, the expected results have not been achieved, because for this it is necessary to carry out accreditation processes in the universities. This implies carrying out an evaluation of each one of the criteria that involves the teaching-learning process such as: Teachers, Students, Infrastructure, Plans and Programs, Administrative Management, Laboratories, Computer Centers, Internet Service and Leadership. The latter is one of the most critical since the officials on duty sometimes do not know how to exercise school leadership (Pont et al., 2008), perhaps because they do not want to commit themselves and only do what they can.
Figure 2. List of the best universities in Mexico. On the left side is the national ranking for the year 2020, and on the right side is the world ranking for the year 2022. Images obtained from El Economista and
Cybermetrics Lab.
There is a large area of opportunity to modify the teaching-learning processes in all modalities: face-to-face, hybrid, virtual; in public universities.
When there are systematized evaluation processes and with a certain periodization in the universities, and also qualitative and quantitative analysis of the results are carried out, these being duly documented, only then could it be said that there is quality in education.
REFERENCES
CACEI (2018). Marco de Referencia 2018 para la acreditación de programas de Ingeniería. Criterios e indicadores. http://cacei.
org.mx/docs/marco_ing_2018.pdf
Cybermetrics Lab. (julio 2022). Ranking web de universidades. https://www.webometrics.info/es/Latin_America_es/
M%C3%A9xico
Diario Oficial de la Federación. (1990). DECRETO por el que se aprueba el programa sectorial de mediano plazo denominado Programa Nacional para la Modernización Educativa 1990-1994. https://www.dof.gob.mx/nota_detalle.
php?codigo=4642738&fecha=26/01/1990#gsc.tab=0
Diario Oficial de la Federación. (1996). Programa de Desarrollo Educativo 1995-2000. https://www.dof.gob.mx/nota_detalle.
php?codigo=4871348&fecha=19/02/1996#gsc.tab=0
Diario Oficial de la Federación. (2003). Programa Nacional de Educación 2001-2006. https://dof.gob.mx/nota_detalle.
php?codigo=706001&fecha=15/01/2003#gsc.tab=0
Diario Oficial de la Federación. (2008). Programa Sectorial de Educación 2007-2012. https://www.dof.gob.mx/nota_detalle.
php?codigo=5028684&fecha=17/01/2008#gsc.tab=0
Diario Oficial de la Federación. (2020). Programa Sectorial derivado del Plan Nacional de Desarrollo 2019-2024. https://www.
dof.gob.mx/nota_detalle.php?codigo=5596202&fecha=06/07/2020#gsc.tab=0
Diario Oficial de la Federación. (s.f.). Programa Sectorial de Educación 2003-2018. https://www.dof.gob.mx/nota_detalle_
popup.php?codigo=5326569
El Economista. (26 diciembre 2020). Ranking de las mejores universidades de México. https://www.eleconomista.com.mx/
arteseideas/Ranking-de-las-Mejores-Universidades-de-Mexico-20201226-0003.html
Maldonado, A. (2000). Los organismos internacionales y la educación en México. vol. XXII, núm. 87, pp. 51-75. http://www.
scielo.org.mx/pdf/peredu/v22n87/v22n87a4.pdf
Márquez, A. (2004). Calidad de la educación superior en México.¿ Es posible un sistema eficaz, eficiente y equitativo? Las políticas de financiamiento de la educación superior en los noventa. Revista Mexicana de Investigación Educativa, 9(21),477- 500. [fecha de Consulta 21 de septiembre de 2022]. ISSN: 1405-6666. https://www.redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=14002109 Pont, B. Nusche, D., Moorman, H. (2008). Mejorando el liderazgo escolar. Volumen 1: política y práctica. OCDE.
Tunnermann C.B.,(1998). Educación Superior en el umbral del siglo XXI. CRESALC/UNESCO. https://www.enriquebolanos.
org/media/publicacion/3146.pdf
